The Elegant Woman
by r4ven3
Summary: Set some time in S9, this is another AU look at a possible development between Ruth and Harry, had the scriptwriters had a heart. A bit of a plot for good measure. One shot only, (and written in a hurry.)


"Ruth?" She hears a familiar voice calling her from his office doorway. "Now," he adds, and her instinct is to ignore him. She really wants to ignore him, but that would be petty, and she is not petty.

So Ruth extracts herself from her task, pushing aside a pile of files in search of a blank pad, which she knows is on her desk somewhere. When she has pad and pen in hand, she hurries into Harry's inner sanctum.

"Sit," he says, waving an arm towards the chair across the desk from his, although he's on his feet, pacing from one side of his desk to the other, having offered her only a cursory glance.

"If it's my report, Harry, you're going to have to wait until three for it."

"This is not about your report, it's … something else."

Ruth has been watching him closely, and for once, Harry appears uncomfortable. _So he should,_ she thinks, but she knows she has little right to a thought so mean-spirited. He is a single man, and what he does in his own time is not her business. It's just that the woman she'd seen, the one whose eyes had caught hers as she'd been waiting at the bus stop after work, had been very beautiful .. and elegant. Elegant is something Ruth would never be, even had she visited the Elegant Shop in search of an Elegant Makeover. And the woman's hair had been blond.

Ruth will never be elegant, and she's not a blond, and it appears that Harry likes both. The previous evening a blond and elegant woman had been with him in his car as he'd driven past her bus stop. Harry had not seen her, but the woman had noticed her interest, and their eyes had held for just a second.

"So what is it?" Ruth asks at last, knowing it won't be about the woman he'd had in his car the evening before, although whether he had, or who she was to him was none of her business. She and Harry are just colleagues, and nothing more.

Harry has stopped pacing, and he is standing behind his chair, his hands grasping the back of his chair so tightly that his knuckles are white. Ruth lifts her eyes to his to see the discomfort he is attempting to push aside while he attempts to put distance between them. It is only then that she notices he is wearing the light grey suit with a lavender tie. The lighter, softer tones suit him, and she smiles into his eyes, not because she's happy to see him, but because she's glad he's wearing that particular suit. It softens him, highlighting his innate gentleness, along with his eye colour.

"I should have told you this … earlier," he begins, avoiding her eyes. Ruth feels her heart beating rapidly, not with passion, but with fear. Here it comes, then, the `I'm seeing someone else' routine. Not that Ruth has any claim at all to Harry or his heart, although she had carried his memory close to her heart during the time she was in exile, and despite the difficulty of her return, little has changed. "I was asked – by Vik Sajid from Six," Harry continues, "to … look into the wife of John Ellenden." Harry lifts his eyes to hers, and it is then she sees more than mere discomfort; she sees embarrassment.

"Who's John Ellenden?" she asks, surprised, since she'd been expecting some kind of confession from him, something along the lines of: `Ruth, I'm sorry to tell you this, but while I've been patiently waiting for you to make up your mind about us, I've met someone else.'

"He's the CEO of the British arm of _Kit Häuser,_ a German company which sells ready-made homes in kit form throughout Europe."

"What has this to do with counter-terrorism?"

"It has been noted by analysts at GCHQ that the influx of German and Russian-made electronic components, those being used in small locally made bombs, coincides almost exactly with the importing of kit homes into the UK."

"All kit homes, or just these?"

"Just these." Harry is watching her closely, and she returns his scrutiny.

"But ..." Ruth hesitates, not wanting him to accuse her of stating the obvious, but it has to be said. "Don't customs have trained people to sniff out electronics?"

"It's possible for these people to be bought, Ruth, and so ..." Harry hesitates, and Ruth knows him well enough to know that there is more, so she waits, boldly holding his gaze. "Vik Sajid suggested that I .. acquaint myself with Ellenden's wife Elaine, so ..."

"He wants you to _honey-trap_ this woman?" Ruth is sitting up in her chair, leaning forward. She is more shocked than outraged, and more pleased than she should be. After all, a honey-trap is hardly a date, which means that Harry hasn't exactly _chosen_ this Ellenden woman as his companion. He is simply following orders.

"Not exactly." Harry is choosing his words carefully, and it is then that Ruth is happy that she knows him so well. "Last night I took Elaine Ellenden to dinner .."

"Where was her husband when you were ..?"

"He's spending this month in Germany. An analyst at GCHQ has him under surveillance. This is a little embarrassing for me to admit to, Ruth, but last night we drove past you while you were waiting at the bus stop."

"I know." She hadn't expected this. She takes a breath and waits.

"Elaine mentioned seeing a brunette woman at the bus stop, gazing at her in shock, and when I looked in the rear view mirror, I saw you before you stepped back and out of sight. I need to tell you that Elaine was very good company, but it wasn't a date, and … nothing happened." Harry leans back in his chair, and Ruth bears witness to his discomfort, as he fiddles with the edge of his mouse pad. "I took her to dinner and pretended to be someone who is considering investing in the British arm of their company. Although Vik suggested that I sleep with her, I had no aspirations … in that direction." When Harry lifts his eyes to hers, Ruth finds that she is smiling.

 _Good_ , she thinks. "I have no claim on you, Harry," is what she says, rather coolly.

He continues to watch her, and she can almost see the discarded comments as they pass across his countenance. When he is the one to break eye contact, Ruth senses a small victory.

"I know that things have been … strained between us, Ruth, and I regret my part in that."

"I wasn't aware of your part in it, Harry."

"I have been offhand, and ..."

"You've been hurt, as we both have. I suggest that neither of us owes the other an apology." Harry is watching her, and Ruth finds it difficult to maintain her train of thought, so she allows her curiosity a voice. "Will you be seeing her again?" she asks quietly.

Harry waits a long time before replying. "We're meeting for drinks today after work." While his eyes hold hers, Ruth cannot look away. She sees apology in his eyes.

"So .. will that be because you enjoy her company, or because she hasn't spilled the beans about her husband's company?"

"I did enjoy her company, but she told me nothing over dinner. She suggested drinks tonight, and I'll meet her, just in case she has something to tell me."

"And if not?"

"It's been a waste of my time, time I could have been ..." and as his voice trails off they both know what he means.

Ruth stands. It is Friday afternoon, and they are at work. It is not the time for True Confessions. "I have … things to be doing," she says, standing and then quickly leaving the office. She can feel Harry's eyes on her back as she crosses the Grid.

* * *

"You should go home, Ruth." It's Harry again, and this time he is standing beside her desk, his coat draped over one arm. "Even Beth has left."

"Beth has a date," Ruth says meaningfully, but omits the words, `like you.' "She always leaves early when she has a date."

"I'm meeting Elaine in .." and Harry lifts his left wrist to check his watch. Ruth also knows that he already knows the time to the minute. He usually does. "… twenty-five minutes," he says, "so I should ..."

"Go, Harry. You don't want to play hard to get. Women don't like that."

They each hold the eyes of the other, so much not being said. "I guess I should .."

"You should," Ruth says, and then she smiles up at him, and he breathes out heavily, turns and leaves.

Something has changed, something delicate and intangible, something which Ruth is almost too afraid to articulate. She watches Harry cross the floor to the door, and then drops her eyes. If she doesn't see him leave, then he could still be on the Grid … where he belongs.

* * *

Without Harry in his office to distract her, Ruth does several searches of her own. First is a search of the staff at the London office of _Kit Häuser;_ they are a stable staff, with no new staff members, or casual employees in the previous twelve months. Just for something to do, Ruth checks the email traffic to and from the terminal used by Elaine Ellenden, and what she finds is a group of encrypted emails to ISP addresses in Germany, Serbia and Russia.

Ruth takes the information to Tariq, who is busily involved with another search.

"How are your encryption skills?" she asks.

"I'm the master," Tariq replies with a grin.

So Ruth hands over the emails, and leaves him to it, but not until she has briefly filled him in on the back story.

"Harry's dating this woman?" Tariq says, clearly scandalised, "but … isn't she married?"

"He's not dating her. It's a ..."

".. fishing expedition."

"Something like that."

Ruth goes out to buy coffee and a sandwich for herself and Tariq, and by the time she returns, he has the code cracked.

"I have little respect for people who use standard encryption," he says. "Like … surely, they know we'll be watching them."

"So what does it say?"

"In a nutshell?"

"Please."

And so he tells her, and Ruth smiles. She considers the extra hours at work well spent. "You should go home, Tariq," she says.

"But -"

"It's hours past home time. You've done well today."

* * *

Ruth enjoys having her flat to herself. She likes Beth a lot, but she can be chaotic, and just her being there can be distracting. Ruth likes her own company, although there is some company she might enjoy. She settles herself on her sofa, but before she opens her book, she sends a text to Harry.

She then waits for a reply, but there is none. Ruth tries to not feel disappointed when almost an hour passes, and there is still no reply from Harry. Perhaps he is enjoying himself. Perhaps he has found Elaine Ellenden irresistible. Perhaps he has taken her to bed. She can hardly blame him if he had.

And then she hears the ring of the front doorbell. It has just gone nine, and Beth is out, and unlikely to be returning that evening, so ….

When the doorbell rings for the second time Ruth hurries to the door, and flings it open. "You could have answered my text," she says, mildly irritated that he has simply turned up at her door unannounced.

"I wanted to surprise you," Harry says warily.

He'd certainly done that. "Tea or coffee?" Ruth asks once they reach the kitchen. "You're in an alcohol free zone, I'm afraid. I haven't had time to -"

"Coffee will be fine," he says quickly, before he takes a chair at the kitchen table, while Ruth makes coffee for them both. "Your text intrigued me," he says. "You said I was in danger, so I made my excuses and left."

"How did she react?"

"Elaine?" Ruth nods. "She asked me was the text from my wife, and I said it was."

Ruth experiences a brief moment of irritation, which she also knows is little more than a reaction born from habit. Deep down where she rarely allows herself to wander, she is rather pleased that he had referred to her as his wife, although what that really means is a question she's not yet ready to ask.

Ruth lifts her eyes to his, watching him through her eyelashes. "And how did she take that?"

"It's hard to tell .. although ..." Harry stops and sips his coffee, and then again lifts his eyes to hers. "You have some news about her?"

"I have. I did a bit of digging, found some emails -"

"Just like that?"

"I did a deep search for them in the company files. They were encrypted, so I gave them to Tariq, who decrypted them." Ruth hesitates, watching Harry closely. His attention is fully on her. It is then that she notices that he is still wearing his pale grey suit, but he's removed the tie. She can hardly blame him for needing to be comfortable at the end of a working week. "Do you want the details, or the short answer?"

"The short answer, please. It's getting late."

Ruth glances at the microwave. It's 9:17, hardly late. She turns back to Harry. "It appears that Elaine Ellenden is the one who organises the inclusion of the electronics when the kit homes are ready for shipment."

"Are you sure?"

"Around 99.9%. There are two men in the warehouse in Bonn who work directly under her, and this next bit is the best part. Her son by her first marriage works for British customs. He is not at the coalface, but he organises the people who are."

"His name?"

"Sam Jelic."

"Croatian? Serbian?"

"His father is Serbian, and now lives in Belgrade. He is the boss of this … hidden part of the organisation, and he appears to be the one who sources the electronic parts."

"Could you determine whether John Ellenden knows about this … sideline to his legitimate business?"

"He's not taken part in the email exchanges, so my guess is that he's clueless."

"That woman should have been a spy," Harry murmurs.

"In a way she already is." Ruth watches Harry for a long moment as he watches her, his expression unreadable. "Tariq has all the information you'll need when you again call your contact at Six."

Harry's nod is only slight, before he sits back in his chair, his eyes still on Ruth. "Where would I be without you?" he asks quietly.

"Oh, I'm sure you'd -"

"I wouldn't, Ruth. Without you I'm ..." and he doesn't finish the sentence. They both know that they have skated over an invisible line into the personal, which is a place they rarely dare go.

"Did she suspect you were … trying to get her to spill the beans?" Ruth has deliberately taken charge of the conversation, leading it back into the safe and manageable zone.

"If she did she didn't show it, but given she organises this whole operation in the UK, she's no doubt a skilled operator. When your text arrived, she had just suggested we retire to her hotel room. Your timing was ..."

"Impeccable? Inconvenient?" Ruth lifts one eyebrow.

"Definitely impeccable."

"And had I not sent the text when I did?"

"I would have politely turned her down."

"How?"

This time, Harry appears uncharacteristically uncomfortable. "I might have mentioned to her that I have a wife."

Ruth nods. The atmosphere between them is still delicate, so when Harry suddenly stands, Ruth's immediate reaction is one of panic. He can't possibly leave yet! But he takes their coffee mugs to the kitchen nook, empties the dregs, and rinses them under the tap. "Another?" he asks, and Ruth nods. For some inexplicable reason she doesn't want Harry to leave, so when she opens her mouth and utters her next words, she wonders where they come from.

"Harry," she says quietly, "do you still … love me?"

Ruth is watching him closely, and she sees his shoulders tighten as his body freezes. She continues to watch him, but he doesn't turn around. "You know I do," he says at last, his voice deep and gravelly, like the words catch in his throat. "Why do you ask?" he adds, turning slowly to face her.

"I'm not sure. I suppose I was … hoping you still did."

Harry watches her in silence, his eyes unsteady as he formulates a reply. "I've never known if you ever loved me, Ruth, so I suppose this is as good a time as any to ask .. that question."

His bravery surprises her. She believes that he deserves to hear the truth. There is a counter top between them, and he is standing while she sits. His eyes never leave her as he waits for her answer. In the end, Ruth speaks without first analysing her words, which is the only way she has of speaking truthfully. "I feel like I've … loved you my whole life," she says, her voice quiet, her words spoken with the reverence they deserve. "Since I first knew that I loved you – back before I left London – I have never stopped … loving you. With every breath I love you."

She can say no more. The rest will be up to him. She waits while he hesitates. A handful of seconds passes as slowly as an hour. The kettle has boiled, so apart from their breathing the room is silent. Ruth wonders should she stand and join him in the kitchen, and then Harry moves quickly to her side. He pulls out a chair on which he sits close to her, facing her. He lifts one hand, then allows it to drop.

"I'm not terribly good at this," he says at last, watching her. "I'm good at .. seduction, but this is ... different. This matters."

"You sound just like me," she says quietly, smiling up at him.

"How so?"

"You're over-thinking this. I think .. _this_ is much less complicated than you think."

Harry still doesn't move, so Ruth reaches out and places her hand on his knee. She has wanted to touch him in this way for such a long time. She has wanted to feel his muscles beneath her hand, to feel him reacting to her touch. She doesn't look at him as she runs her palm from his knee along his thigh, and then back to his knee. She feels tension in him, so she does it again, this time reaching higher up his thigh, but not too high. That wouldn't be fair. When she runs her palm along his thigh for the third time, she allows her thumb to caress his inner thigh. When she hears a strangled sigh from him, she removes her hand.

"Don't," he says. "Don't stop."

This time Ruth reaches her hand to his cheek, where she runs her thumb across his bottom lip. This time Harry acts. He leans in to her and places his lips on hers. His lips are warm and soft, but the kiss is over all too soon. Ruth lifts both hands to his neck, and then as if by prior agreement they both stand, and then press themselves together. Ruth remembers the last time this had happened, as she was about to go into exile. They fit together perfectly, as they had back then. The uncertainty in his eyes changes to a smile, and through the places where their bodies touch she can feel him relaxing.

This time the kiss is leisurely, lasting a long time. Only for a moment does his tongue seek hers, touching briefly before it retreats, and their kiss again becomes soft rather than seeking, loving rather than passionate. By the time they pull apart they are both warm, and smiling into the eyes of the other. "Stay the night," she says, and she then sees the hesitation as he pulls away from her a little.

"I want to. You have no idea how much I want to stay, Ruth."

"Then stay."

When Harry says nothing more, Ruth begins to fold in on herself. She panics in case he is changing his mind. She doesn't know what to say to keep him with her … in her flat, and she desperately wants him to stay. Tomorrow may be too late.

It is as though he can read her mind. "We'll still love one another tomorrow, Ruth," Harry says, wrapping his arms around her, smiling as he feels her arms sliding around him beneath his jacket. "I have a full day tomorrow," he says against her hair, "beginning early in the morning, so I thought tomorrow night we can eat out somewhere -"

"Or we can eat here. I'll cook."

"You don't have to, Ruth."

"I know. It's easier if you come here, I cook, and then we climb the stairs."

Harry pulls away a little, still holding her, watching her. Ruth waits for a long time until she sees him nod. "Very well. Here it is, then"

Ruth pushes down her fears and insecurities. He means this. She means it. At last they agree on something. She knows her fears are irrational. She lifts her face to him to see the love shining from his eyes.

"You're everything I've ever wanted, Ruth. I can hardly wait for tomorrow, but I will. The waiting will make it so much sweeter."

And Harry is right. The waiting _was_ worth it. A thousand times.


End file.
